Long Sunday

Continuation, continuation

1. In a recent lecture entitled ‘War as Politics, Politics as War’, Etienne Balibar elegantly locates the central aporia of Clausewitz’s On War: the factor that led to that text remaining unfinished and, to its author’s mind, radically in need of revision. The problem lies in the ‘continuation’ that inhabits the famous definition of war as ‘the continuation of politics by other means’. There is a certain quarantining of politics that occurs here, as if politics remains ‘the logic’ and war ‘the instrument’. But Clausewitz’s formulation can also be read as a warning that ‘the violent means of war remain political means only if their own consequences and, again, retroactive effects on those who use them, their own “logic” do not escape the political rationality or subvert it’. And, with this possibility, there emerges a certain doubling in the definition of war.

What seems to be the case is that war, with respect to politics, has to be considered twice, from two different angles. It is not the whole of politics (since politics has other procedures than war, equally necessary), but it concerns and affects the essence of politics, which is revealed and, practically, determined by the ways in which it recurs to war, and the consequences on politics itself of the political use of the violent means of war. Certainly what Clausewitz wants to avoid (and we will see that it is not without difficulties, and that the question keeps haunting his successors) is to assert that recurring to war is the essence of politics, that the use of the violent means of war, with its logical and existential implications (such as the necessity to designate one or several “enemies”), defines the concept of the political, which in turn can lead to the reversal of the initial statement (namely that “politics is the continuation”, or the “consequence” of war). But Clausewitz wants (or needs) to be able to make the question of the use of war as an “instrument”, and the question of the converse effects of this use upon politics itself its crucial characteristic.

For Balibar, what is, for Clausewitz, an undesirable threat, namely, that politics might become the continuation of war, becomes legible only if considered alongside another three axioms that are central to Clausewitz’s argument: the strategic superiority of defence over attack, the distinction between limited and absolute war, and the primacy of moral over strategic factors in the history of wars. Each of these propositions must be read as supporting and qualifying the others but, both individually and in unison, they pivot on an ambivalence by which the ‘politicization’ of war threatens the rationality of politics. Clausewitz’s dilemma derives from his insistence that, at least in modern times, all wars must take the form of national and therefore nationalistic wars. This poses the problem of how to control the new popular power that emerged with modernity, requiring the state to permanently run ahead of its people’s passions. As Balibar puts it, Clausewitz faced ‘the military or strategic equivalent of the political problem faced by national states in general: how to “institutionalize the insurrection”, or harness the multitude’.

Partisan of No Part

(The following is a guest post by Nate Hawthorne, who authors the blog, What in the hell...?)

In 1972 Mario Tronti presented a paper dealing with Carl Schmitt at the University of Turin. Whether beginning or example, this presentation is of a conceptual turn in which "Schmittian elements became part of a thoroughgoing 'Marxist critique of Marxism' which sought (...) to put a practical theory of power squarely at the centre of revolutionary theorizing." (Muller, A Dangerous Mind, 179.) The Marxisti Schmittiani exemplify the problematic relationship of "Karl und Carl" which Tronti later characterizes, albeit not critically enough, as foundational to political theory.

There are several aspects in Schmitt's Theory of the Partisan resonant with the sensibility of operaismo and subsequent developments which take Tronti's early work as a touchstone. One such similarity is the relationship posited between resistance and constituted power wherein the former forces the latter to attempt to render resistance productive of innovation in the forms of power-over. In response to the partisan's irregularity, there are produced "new concepts of warfare (...) along with a new doctrine of war and politics" (3), such as that embodied in the Prussian Landsturm edict of 1813. A similar point can be seen in the chapter on the working day in volume one of Capital, concepts and law are produced in response to working class struggle. Technology as well. "The partisan too participates in the development - in the progress - of modern technology and its science." (54.) Again there is a Marxian parallel: "It would be possible to write quite a history of the inventions, made since 1830, for the sole purpose of supplying capital with weapons against the revolts of the working-class.” (Capital v1, ch15.)

Tronti blogweave

For your quick or leisurely perusal, the compilation of Long Sunday's recent symposium on Mario Tronti's "The Strategy of the Refusal", and some remarks.  The multitudinous, but alphabetised, contributions:

»Jon Beasley-Murray, The new barbarians
»Eric Beck, Minor refusals
»George Ciccariello-Maher, Class and subalternity
»Jodi Dean, Two questions on Tronti [follow-up]
»Roger Gathman Fantasy sites and the conquistadors of the planet
»Nate Hawthorne, Notes on "The Strategy of the Refusal"
»John Holloway, Adorno meets Tronti
»Doug Johnson, Intellectuals, the refusal of power, office workers' unions
»Brian Lamb, I would prefer not to bore you
»Craig McFarlane, Refusing to engage
»David McInerney, Tronti and Althusser
»Angela Mitropoulos, When will this labour end?
»Brett Neilson, Five theses on Tronti
»Stephen Squibb, Strategy of refusal of strategy
»Keith Tilford, How no can you go? Part I [Part II]

The preamble to the Long Sunday symposium, which includes links to related texts.  The relevant essay by Tronti is here, and a quick link to Long Sunday's Tronti folder. 

There were also a number of related posts elsewhere:  Destructive Creation, Northanger, Going Somewhere, Philosophy.com, pas au-delà, Attitude Adjustor. (Those are the most directly related to the discussion, though I wouldn't be surprised if I've missed some.)  And, not least, there is always the ongoing reading at Leggiamo Tronti.

My immense gratitude to all those who contributed their writings, readings and questions - those who simply took the time to read along with, and specifically those, such as Matt, who spent much time coding and uploading.

Already, Jon has the ball rolling for another reading, and I'm hoping that blogweaving continues, mutates and grows.  Not only because it creates a shared conversation that cuts across various blogs without converging along the one line, but also because - in ways that have yet to be fully explored - it marks an autonomy of writing, reading and research from the university that, particularly in times such as these, becomes an imperative.  Needless to say, what we read and write is related to how we read and write, no less than it is to the diificult questions of who, how and why this 'we' might appear, in that process.

Many thanks for the adventure.

When will this labour end?

Labouring against work. Mulling over the contributions and remarks made during the course of these readings, this is what strikes me as the first paradox, which is also the specific paradox of abstract labour and concrete labours that, in turn, characterises Marx's distinctive account of capitalism, that which brings all others paradoxes to the fore and makes them boil over. It's all about specificity, the difference and the cut. And is there anything more paradoxical than communism, a class politics that gears itself toward the abolition of class society? Operaismo - ie., workerism - against work. And Tronti's essay is nothing if not paradoxical.

Who would have guessed that a discussion of the refusal of work would result in so much toil?

Adorno meets Tronti

(This is a guest post by John Holloway, author of Change the World Without Taking Power.)

It is clear that non-identity is the hero, the centre, the moving force of the world as Adorno presents it.  But what do we understand by non-identity?  Is it just a philosophical concept or is the conceptualisation of a social force?  The answer, surely, is that we are non-identity.  The force that does not fit, the force that contradicts all identification, the force that overflows is subjectivity, we.  And who are we?  We are the subject, uncontainable within any definition.  We can say that we are the working class, but that makes sense only if we understand "working class" as a concept that explodes against itself, a concept that bursts its own bounds.

Refusing to Engage

Reading Tronti has been somewhat of an experience.  Consequently, I'm not sure how to proceed with my comments because my reading of Tronti has alternated between fascination and boredom.  Perhaps these two responses to Tronti are closely related because, Tronti, who I've never read before, appears both as  new and sedimented.  Some of the ideas are quite familiar and in this respect we might speak of Tronti as an origin and thus an interesting spark of creativity, but, at the same time, his ideas have appeared over the past forty years in fragmented form, most notably in Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno. Fascination & boredom; new & old.

Tronti and Althusser

(This is a guest posting by David McInerney, editor of "Althusser & Us", Borderlands.*)

The following does not constitute a close reading of "The Strategy of Refusal", or its place within Tronti's work more generally.  Given other demands, the best I can do is relate Tronti's work to my recent study of Louis Althusser's defence/rethinking of the concept of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat and its relations to his "aleatory materialism".  For me, the affinities between Althusser and Tronti stand out most clearly with respect to their shared opposition to both Eurocommunism and Stalinism, the difficulties that both faced in grasping the immanent demise of post-WWII social democracy, and the irruption of neoliberalism into European politics (which I think Jodi Dean commented on).  And yet, it is perhaps because of this fact that their work remains valuable, considering the pre-Marxist dross of "radical democracy" (the reanimated Bernstein that passes for "post-marxism") that dominates Left thinking today.

Intellectuals, the refusal of power, office workers' unions

(The following is a guest post by Doug Johnson, from The Weblog)

A critique of culture means to refuse to be intellectuals.  Theory of revolution means direct practice of the class struggle. - Mario Tronti, "The Strategy of the Refusal"

So far as I know, Steve Wright's tendentious and hackneyed monograph Storming Heaven: Class Composition and Struggle in Italian Autonomist Marxism is unfortunately the best (perhaps only?) English language, book length account of the movement from which Antonio Negri arose.  Wright is highly critical of Negri, and basically attributes the downfall of Autonomia to the forsaking by Negri and others of Tronti's insistence that there be "no intellectuals," that "theory of revolution" must always be undertaken by those who "direct[ly] practice class struggle" through time in the factory.

How No Can You Go?

(The following is a guest essay by Keith Tilford, author of the weblog Metastable Equilibrium.  It is very long but, like everything on Long Sunday, hardly bored, or boring.  Update:  Part II is now here.)

Michael Blum, still from "Wandering Marxwards", 1999

What follows definitely took some liberties with a reading of Tronti.  I used “The Strategy of The Refusal” more as a point of departure than anything else, as I wanted to focus generally on the notion of refusal – on its creative/inventive capacities - and attempt to make visible some of the relationships between art practices since the 1960’s and the trajectory of operaismo and autonomia along with the theoretical works that have come out of Italy.  So perhaps in the spirit of Zizek’s book on Deleuze that he didn’t write, this can be my post on Tronti that I didn’t write.  The post is divided into four parts, the first two will be here at LS, but because of excessive length I’ll be posting the last two parts over at my blog if the reader is interested (one is a more in depth consideration of the work of artist Francis Alys, and the other on “anorectic subjectivities” which acts as a kind of conclusion).  This is really part of a wider research interest of mine, but I am very pleased that this symposium took place since it gave me the chance to return to some of those interest.  Call this a draft, then. Many of the themes taken up in the second part of this post are also adressed in Howard Slater's essay "The Spoiled Ideals of Lost Situations", which is meant to accompany a reading of the book Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology, where most of the artist's writings I've used can be found.  Two artists that I have not been able to squeeze into this, but would highly recommend that anyone interested with what’s being said here check out are Thomas Hirschhorn (see here) and especially Santiago Sierra (a little about him here).  Also, I should point out that while the word “practice” appears throughout, many artists today (including myself) really don’t like this word.  I’ll skip giving reasons for the moment.  Perhaps Ranciere’s “ways of doing and making within the aesthetic regime of the arts” would have been better, though long-winded – and out of laziness I have not yet modified any of that.  However, the word does appear in inverted commas at several points, which I’m sure Matt will appreciate.

I. Double-Headed Histories

"Look at any word long enough and you will see it open up into a series of faults into a terrain of particles each containing its own void." – Robert Smithson

"The clear division between reality and fiction makes a rational logic of history impossible as well as a science of history." – Jacques Ranciere

With nearly forty years separating us from the first publication of Tronti’s essay “The Strategy of The Refusal”, a document showing that the struggle against work was actually essential to the development of capital, what to make of it now, in light so many radical, and at times even invisible or largely unnoticed mutations in the constitution of contemporary capitalism?  Perhaps some possible answers can be recognized in Tronti’s formulation that ‘against the old forms of struggle and resistance’ should be installed new forms of political organization and refusal.  It seems apparent then, that to think refusal today should invest in the same formulation – this time polemically positioned against Tronti.  Why?  Because from within the paradigm of “The Strategy of Refusal” is a rigorous division of class – and one that seems to run the risk of merely satisfying a dialectic and binary representational machinism; the categories of ‘worker’ and ‘party’ seem to end up installing themselves within the very representations that the workers would have intended to overthrow, a move which became thwarted by their own becoming-major.  So perhaps some solutions to envisioning contemporary forms of refusal might begin along the lines suggested by Deleuze and Guattari: to think minority instead of class.  To say this does not mean denying that there are classes, or that there is a ruling class; only that refusal, resistance – what composes and calls for them - are not reducible to the antagonisms of a class division.  As the Italian Futurist FT Marinetti once said, “language is the motherload of all culture”, and it is without doubt impossible to follow the consequences of Tronti’s initial formulations without encountering and taking into much consideration all the nominations which have entered and continue to circulate through the “post-Fordist” lexicon as a result of the ‘failures’ of the Italian operaismo: social subjectivity, social chain, multitude, social factory, the general intellect, generic will, compositionism, immaterial or cognitive labour…

In coincidence with the workers movement as a particular history of struggles and theoretical works lay another long history of artistic practices and revolutions that could be said to have aimed at constructing solidarities with such resistances and refusals.  If the artists and workers caught up in these histories shared a common enemy it was certainly ‘capital’ – though such an enemy will always express itself in different forms relative to a given situation or milieu.  In Italy it was the factory; with artists, the museum, institution, or gallery.  In both instances there was a resistance toward the system’s control that manifested itself in the engaged and active search for an outside set against received modes of subjectivity and the “conjugations of the axiomatic” (D & G); a search that concerned itself with the invention of new forms of life and work aimed at the embetterment of society as a whole.  This other history, with loose ties to the attitudes of such localized movements as the Bauhaus in Germany and the Russian Constructivists (or for that matter more diffuse movements such as Dada), initiated new inquiries into modes of aesthetic production conceived through a kind of ‘anti-aesthetic’ which intersected with the ambitions of the Italian workers and autonomia during the 1960’s and 1970’s.  Such coincidence figures into the attempts made by artists during this period to resist both the sedentary space of an elitist institution and the commodity form of the artwork in what came to known as Conceptual Art.

I would prefer not to bore you

(The following is a guest post by Brian Lamb, author of the weblog Abject Learning.)

If you've been following the symposium this far, it's unlikely I'm can offer you a distinctive analysis of Tronti.   I've really enjoyed and learned a lot from reading the posts and comments this week but my theory discourse skills, never my strength, are presently in a derelict state.  Yet I was drawn to make at least a tangential contribution to this process in part by the power of Bartleby, invoked by Jodi's Long Sunday post on Bartleby in Power which, as Jon notes, was a precursor to this symposium.

I harbour a long-time fascination with Melville's uncanny anti-hero--depending on when I've read the story it's struck me as a marvel of style (Melville writes a Poe story!), as an examination of writing itself, as a covert sci-fi representation of entropic forces dispersing human vitality into the void of cosmic heat-death, or a preview of how of most my favorite twentieth century fiction would eventually define itself.

And of course, there is the satire of capitalism in this "Story of Wall Street".   And Bartleby himself as a figure of refusal.  Though when I enjoy scenes of Bartleby generating chaos in the legal office my Marxist reading is more of the Groucho, Harpo and Chico variety...